


Black Arrow: Somewhere in the Middle of it All

by devilduckieee



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/F, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-29
Updated: 2015-12-29
Packaged: 2018-05-10 03:00:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5568238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilduckieee/pseuds/devilduckieee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All they wanted to do was enjoy a masquerade for charity, but sometimes that's just not in the cards. </p><p>A DC Universe crossover AU with a liberal remixing of cannon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Black Arrow: Somewhere in the Middle of it All

**Author's Note:**

> I love my betas and so should you. Please have fun.

Lexa took one last look in the mirror, confirming that everything was in place and no trace of identity would be revealed. A well-worn form-fitting white linen jacket with dark red gashes of color came down just past Lexa’s hips. The back of the coat came to a point at Lexa’s knees and was split in the middle for easy movement. The hood was longer than most, coming down low, with a gentle curve that followed both of Lexa’s brows and ended in a point just above the nose. Delicate swirl patterns of silver thread were spread throughout the jacket and were nearly undetectable to Lexa’s eyes unless the jacket moved, then it seemed to sparkle. The surrounding area of Lexa’s eyes were painted black, the design traced over cheekbones and dripped downwards at different points with the final dripped point ending at the back of Lexa’s jaw. The bottom of Lexa’s face was covered in a nearly invisible mineral glitter that, like her coat, was only visible when Lexa moved. Lexa pulled on the other white linen glove and checked to make sure the snug white linen pants, that had the same silver patterns as the jacket, were properly tucked into the shin-high white leather boots. 

When Lexa designed the outfit for the infamous Blake Masquerade it was with the intention for the costume to be ephemeral and ethereal. The intention was to infiltrate the ball and have people question whether Lexa had really been there at all. The point was to be remembered, but just barely, like waking up from a dream. This costume would work perfectly for that. With that confidence in the outfit, Lexa went to the Blake Estate.

The Blakes were well known brother and sister socialites of Gotham City that gave off the same air that far too wealthy spoiled children do. They liked to throw parties, and only invite the most elite of the elite as a reminder to the people of Gotham, and those elites, of just how much money they had. How much power they had. They knew exactly how to present themselves to a world that expected the orphaned at too young an age siblings to be self centered brats. Especially in a city like Gotham, overrun for far too long by crime syndicates led by the filthiest of filth. The Blakes enjoyed shining their public personas, they served well to protect their alter-egos from ever being discovered. The irony of the Blakes pretending that they were who Lexa once used to be sometimes brought a cringe and added weight of guilt, but whenever that happened a beautiful canary of life tended to remind Lexa of how much things have changed. Bellamy Blake is the sole reason that canary is in Lexa’s life, a fact he loves to point that fact out every opportunity he gets.

Lexa didn’t want to be introduced to the party. As was the tradition with the Blake Masquerade, guests were given some made up and randomly generated nickname spouted from the specially created computer program written by the infamous Monty Green of Green Industries (a close Blake family friend). The nicknames serve as a means for the attendees to communicate without giving up their identities for, at the end of every Blake Masquerade, the big unveiling with a prize going to the guest who could correctly identify everyone in attendance. Lexa would be introduced only if needed, with the invitation stashed in the secret pocket on the inside of the costume jacket to confirm that she was truly meant to attend. Lexa wasn’t trying to cheat the game by remaining anonymous, that was the point in the computer program after all, but after it only providing Lexa with the nickname of “Commander” every single year -- something Green couldn’t explain despite numerous checks and tweaks of coding -- it was time to deviate from traditional means.

“Planning on making a dramatic entrance?” A low raspy voice asked in a whisper from behind and Lexa carefully turned around on her perch, a stone dais placed between hedges above the courtyard below.

“Not as dramatic as this must imply, I assure you.” Lexa whispered in reply to the masked figure in all black. Lexa could barely make the figure out as they stood in the shadows of the stone balcony that hadn’t been noticed until then.

“Go on, then.” The figure gestured with their black gloved hand. “Just don’t upstage me.”

Lexa’s head tilted in mild confusion, but turned around anyway. More people had gathered in the courtyard. Sounds of laughter and conversation made their way up above the melodious music the orchestra was playing. Lexa took it all in with an inhale, the exhale came with the soft thud of boots on the floor below. The masked figure had been wrong in their assumption, Lexa didn’t want an entrance. When one makes an entrance it automatically implies that there’d be some sort of exit to follow. Lexa would much rather drift in and out of the ball goers consciousness, like some sort of illusion. No one seemed aware that the ball had a recent addition, the flow of the revelry as constant as the surface of a pond. Lexa began to mingle.

The decor was spectacular. Filament bulbs of different sizes hung down at varying levels by black cords wrapped around nearly invisible wires, attached to the parallel building sides of the courtyard. Looking up at them, Lexa found it easy to pretend that the sea of light bulbs were floating all on their own. There were silk panels of color sporadically hanging down from the same wires as the bulbs. No color repeated and visually it was stunning, but slightly confusing, until Lexa moved throughout the room and noticed that each panel represented a different theme. 

There was a commotion towards the center of the courtyard, a cacophony of gasps trickling outward like a wave and capturing everyone’s attention. Lexa followed the pointed fingers of the noisy guests and saw the masked figure from before had now moved to the light. Lexa had been wrong, the figure was in a deep navy blue outfit not too different from what Lexa was wearing. They were jumping from lit balcony to lit balcony, then up to a low roof on the far end of the courtyard where they seemingly disappeared. While the other attendees had turned to each other to gossip about what they’d just seen, Lexa eyes kept searching the tops of the buildings for a possible indication of where the figure would next appear. 

Lexa would’ve never predicted for them to appear in the center of the courtyard via a cloud of smoke. The smoke cleared to reveal a roguish smirk and ample bosom. Lexa would recognize that bosom anywhere. The smirk too, but Lexa was only human after all. Lexa looked up and met sparkling blue irises. The slow wink confirmed that the Black Canary knew exactly who Lexa was as well. Lexa returned the wink with a mild smirk.

Game on.

\----

If Clarke hadn’t been so intimately acquainted with Lexa, she might not have been able to identify the figure that’d been lurking in the shadows below her. Clarke was nearly positive at the whispered formal sentence from the white clad figure, that she knew who was beneath. Lexa’s voice, in every variation, was one of Clarke’s favorite things. It wasn’t until she saw Lexa move that Clarke knew she was right. No one moved with the same precision of the Green Arrow, with the way that even the air seemed to move out of the way when Lexa was moving by. It often took Clarke’s breath away. So, she sat and watched for a while, just to silently observe one of her favorite people try and blend in. The white with crimson accented sparkling outfit made it impossible for Lexa to blend in though, Clarke could see all the heads turn at the beauty before them.

It wasn’t long before Clarke noticed that Lexa was getting a bit too much attention. Clarke’s brow furrowed slightly as she saw the subtle shift of the crowd, like insects to a lamp being switched on, they were being drawn in Lexa’s direction by some invisible pull. Clarke couldn’t blame them, she knew exactly how enchanting Lexa’s presence was, but Clarke also knew how much the attention was not wanted. Time to make her appearance.

She knew the Blake Estate like the back of her hand. She’d practically grown up with the Blakes, back in simpler and more innocent times. Before Bellamy and Octavia’s parents, and her own father, were gunned down in an alley coming back from a show. Her mother tried to stay in Gotham, so that Clarke, Octavia and Bellamy had comfort in familiarity, but watching the crime rise unchecked became too much and she moved them to Star City. Clarke stayed in constant contact with the Blakes, they’d been irrevocably bonded that night, and every summer was spent in safe confines of the Blake Estate under the protective watch of their caretaker Kane. It was there that they decided to take things into their own hands, since the cops were either too corrupt or inept to get anything done, and adopt vigilante alter-egos to prevent what happened to them from happening to anyone else. 

Clarke knew how to climb every surface of this courtyard and use it to her advantage to truly make a spectacular entrance. Judging by the gasps she heard from the patrons below, attention had been captured away from her darling Lexa and were now fully on her gymnastics. She took advantage of her knowledge of the buildings surrounding her to hop her way up to the chain that the three of them used to practice climbing and jumping from, sometimes they’d used it to swing out over the courtyard that used to have an inflatable landing pad in it. Clarke was relying on those sense memories to pull off the last bit of her entrance. It was much easier these days, with decades of training and body control. Clarke could tell that she pulled it off perfectly when the ball had fallen completely silent, not even the orchestra continued their play. She searched immediately for the green-amber eyes of Lexa, hidden beneath a white hood. Just like nearly everything when it came to their connection, Lexa knew what Clarke was searching out and raised her chin just enough for Clarke to see the color before it hid behind a wink. 

Clarke watched in what seemed like slow motion as Lexa’s head snapped to the side and up. She noticed the flare of Lexa’s nostril and saw the Green Arrow reach over their shoulder for an arrow that wasn’t there. Clarke tried to follow where Lexa was looking, but couldn’t see through the sea of people now surrounding her. Then, as if time had realized that it had slowed down at some point and needed to catch up to where it should be, sped fast forward. Clarke heard what sounded like a firework, but there wasn’t an echo, which only meant one thing. She didn’t have time to remember what that thing was before she felt something colliding with her body, knocking her over. Oxygen escaped her lungs and the weight on top of her, or maybe it was the fall, preventing her from being able to breathe. 

Gun. 

It was a gunshot.

\---

There was something infinitely amusing about blending in with a crowd. It wasn’t something Raven got to do often. It wasn’t even something she really wanted to do. She was special, and so much more than the average being on this planet, she never really wanted to be lumped in with everyone else. That said, dressing in costumes was fun, experiencing humans in costumes provided her with much mental fodder. One of her favorite things to do was to shift her appearance just enough to seem “man made”, but with just enough “other” to stupefy all around her. She needs something to amuse her when she gets bored, thinking of the Earthlings reactions provided plenty of amusement and incentive to come up with the next spectacle. She enjoyed being able to indirectly control the emotions and thoughts around her by simple manipulation of her outfit. Raven preferred that to having to block out the varying emotions and thoughts that came with crowds.

Still, when it came to this particular masquerade, she preferred to stay on the edges of the room. Just in case she needed to leave, just in case the extra precautions set in place didn’t hold, and she needed to pop out for a breather and centering. Raven was managing just fine. Being on one of the arms of the most gorgeous people in the room had an amazing way of distracting Raven from any unpleasantness. 

“You’re staring.” Octavia thought at Raven, not moving her head away from the person currently talking to her. The person was in some ridiculously gaudy, yet completely traditional, masquerade outfit and was rattling off about something to do with the financials of some company. It had been taking all of Raven’s willpower to not yawn, so she had decided to distract herself in Octavia (who actually was paying some attention to the man, because when it came to business and justice Octavia had no qualms with being ruthlessly efficient about things) even though her eyes were covered by a blood red leather mask that framed the top half of her face it was clear that Octavia was following the conversation. It was a pity, because Octavia’s eyes were mesmerizing, but the costume design demanded such travesty and so they obliged.

“You’re gorgeous.” Raven replied, using their mental connection, “besides, you know how much I enjoy Business Octavia. Shall we talk about _mergers_ later?” Raven slipped a bit of her emotions in her reply, and was rewarded with the slight rose tint that appeared on Octavia’s neck. Raven always loved it when Octavia wore her hair up, it was was a rare glimpse when she wasn’t in her crime-fighting outfit. Not that Raven didn’t appreciate Octavia’s black hair while it was roaming wild and free, like she tended to wear her own hair, but there was just something about the way Octavia’s neck met her jaw and the line of her ears that captivated Raven endlessly. It was even better when Octavia’s hair was up like it currently was, in a haphazardly loose fashion so that tendrils escaped and alighted upon the well defined lines of that junction. 

A rumble of laughter distracted Raven away from her staring, again. She leaned back slightly to look at the man gracing Octavia’s other arm, who winked at her.

“Don’t worry, you’re gorgeous too.” Raven told Lincoln telepathically, Raven could feel his amusement and affection. He really was just as beautiful as Octavia, with his dark brown skin and defined, but polished, lines. The man was like a walking statue crafted by Michelangelo, but in all the right dimensions and proportions. Lincoln really was quite distracting in his own right, especially when Raven was trying to block out all the other people in the room. His outfit didn’t help matters either. The three of them decided to coordinate their outfits into a primary color hybrid of hear no evil, see no evil and speak no evil, with the intent of looking quite sinful themselves. Lincoln custom made their leather outfits of vest, pants and mask in their specific primary color. Raven never considered that yellow could ever look good, but Lincoln’s outfit proved her wrong. The way the yellow mask concealed the lower half of his face and wove around securely attaching itself to his ears was a feat of leatherworking magic. (It was a hobby of his, he found something comforting about escaping technology and doing something with just his hands.) Raven might’ve enchanted it slightly, at his request, to emit a subtle glow that highlighted his beautiful dark brown eyes and long eyelashes. 

She was a sucker for brown eyes. And Octavia’s neck area. And the cheekbones of her favorite gray morality feline character. Honestly, Raven just enjoyed appreciating the important people in her life. It was easy for her to get distracted in the people she considered home, once she saw the beauty inside their hearts it was hard to not get distracted. 

The party was going well. All the guests she passed were in awe that she found a cloak of such an amazing color of blue. The smirk that had a tendency to always be attached to her mouth was much closer to a smile, she always enjoyed it when others appreciated her work. Raven was feeling warm with mirth, she was having trouble containing her natural purple glow from showing through her brown skin. So, naturally, that’s when she was psychically assaulted by three very distinct things: fear, the sudden absence of someone very important, and a tainted sense of pleasure. 

Raven made a quick visual check of her surroundings, looking for anyone paying attention to her, upon finding that she was not capturing any unwanted attention in the moment she blinked out and followed the emotions to where the corruption originated. She blinked back into the dimension wearing her traditional crime-fighting outfit, a black singlet and purple cloak, and found herself on one of the balconies above the courtyard below, she saw the crowd swarming around a figure in dark blue holding a figure in white. Raven knew who they were, but could not let it register in the moment, she had a job to do. The area permeated with Deathstroke’s presence. Raven was sure she could even taste the foul air that followed him everywhere. 

She blinked out of the dimension again and followed the stench that followed Deathstroke everywhere he went. As Raven followed the trail she sent a brief mental message to Anya about what was happening and to look into the situation on her end of things, whose only response was to get out of her head. Raven could tell that she had found the current location of Deathstroke and popped back into reality and only had a second to register the situation of him aiming a gun at the large stone wall that surrounded the Blake Estate before finding the nearest object, a particularly large garden gnome that they’d taken to calling Bruce, and throwing it at Deathstroke. She added speed to the momentum of the gnome, in hopes of it hitting the villain before he could shoot his gun at the wall. But he stepped out of the way and threw a sonic grenade from his ungunned hand at her in the same moment. Distracted by trying to contain the grenade and throw it back at her nemesis, she missed him shooting his gun at the wall. She did not miss the grenade sailing through the hole in the wall that used to be solid, and where Deathstroke was once standing. 

“Damnit!” She cursed as she investigated the hole, whose edges were glowing like liquid lava. Deathstroke was nowhere to be found, she couldn’t even feel where he might’ve gone. He’d come prepared for her being there. She inspected the wall again, wanting to know if the glowing bits of wall really were lava. It certainly appeared that way. There were even coarse chunks of light black rock on the other side of the wall, Raven picked one up and it certainly seemed to have all the properties of lava rock. Envious, enraged and frustrated, she blinked back to the courtyard.

\---

The horrific realization that someone had the audacity to bring a gun to a Blake Masquerade shocked the air back into her body. She looked down at the weight on top of her and saw the crown of a head she spent years learning, brown hair and braids she loved running her fingers through and tying. Clarke brought her hand up and to Lexa’s head, but Lexa didn’t move. She inhaled and forced herself to remain calm as she assessed Lexa for injuries. Clarke blindly moved her hands over Lexa’s head and then down to shoulders, finding nothing, until coming to a still warm hole in the middle of her Green Arrow’s back.

There was a gust of air and a soft landing of boots on the ground next to where Clarke lay. She moved her head and saw the black outfit with signature blue insignia of one of her best friends. This wasn’t masquerade wear, something serious was actually happening, it wasn’t just an elaborate show as Clarke had been hoping. If Octavia was in costume, that meant alter-egos needed to be protected, there were enemies about. It wasn’t some random person with a gun, it was an enemy.

“Nightwing, I can’t…” Clarke gestured with her hands at the warm hole she’d found at Lexa’s back.

“Your Arrow is fine.” Nightwing crouched over and inspected Lexa’s back, “The kevlar beneath the costume stopped the bullet.” Nightwing helped to lift Lexa off of Clarke so that she could move. “Batass is off with Cyborg to find the fucker who did this.”

“Cage.” Lexa coughed out, Clarke immediately moved to help Lexa sit up. “Cage Wallace was who fired the shot, I…” Lexa looked at Clarke, as if to make sure she was real, “He sneered at me before he fired.”

“That’s what you were looking at.” Clarke realized.

“Who?” Nightwing asked, her hands on her hips. 

“Deathstroke.” Clarke scowled.

“Gross.” Raven commented as she popped up floating in the space on the other side of Lexa.

“Fuck, I hate it when you do that.” Nightwing shoved Raven in the shoulder.

“That is not what you said last night.” Raven’s purple hood covered her face, but not the smirk that appeared on her lips. 

“Ladies, I love you, dearly, but a soulless mercenary just tried to kill my wife. Again.” Lexa pulled the hood back on, Clarke couldn’t help herself and straightened the outline of the opening to perfectly line up with Lexa’s nose.

“So domestic, makes me puke.” Raven commented and looked at Nightwing, “Deathstroke’s gone. Totally escaped through the literal hole in the fence he made from a lava gun, apparently?”

“He’s such a douchebag.” Nightwing threw her head back in frustration.

“Who gives a guy like him a lava gun? Who builds a lava gun, and why don’t I have one?!” 

“Raven, you literally could be a lava gun.” Clarke rolled her eyes at her friends. “Or, like, worse. You just popped up out of nowhere and glow purple.”

“That doesn’t mean that a girl doesn’t want nice things.”

“I was really looking forward to dancing with you.” Lexa whispered and drew Clarke’s attention. She felt Lexa’s gloved hand softly trace her jaw. 

“We don’t need music to dance.” Clarke moved her head and placed a kiss on Lexa’s glove. She traced the lining of Lexa’s hood with her fingertips, “Shame such a gorgeous outfit didn’t get to be shown off like it deserved.”

“You might not have had the time to dance with each other,” Bellamy’s deep voice drew their focus. His arms were offered towards them and helped them stand. “But everyone saw the silver angel flying to rescue the blue goddess that appeared via acrobatics and smoke.” 

Clarke saw the subtle rose tint appearing on Lexa’s skin and decided that the subject should be changed. She looked around at the, now empty, courtyard in a meaningless quest for a clue as to the reason behind Deathstroke’s strike. She looked up into Bellamy’s warm brown eyes beneath the black rubber mask he wore and mumbled, “It doesn’t make any sense, Batman.”

“The coast is clear, no need for the formalities." He chuckled then ran his fingers through his hair as looked around the courtyard himself, “You’re right. Why now? Why the Masquerade?”

“Maybe he got wind of the atrocious costume you were wearing, and felt it his civil duty to prevent mass blindness.” Raven joked. Clarke appreciated the attempt at levity. Sometimes, in their line of work, it was just what Clarke needed. Especially after being shot at.

“I’ll have you know that mango velour is all the rage in Milan.” Bellamy crossed his arms over his chest and rolled his eyes.

“Is that what my sister told you?” Lexa asked. Clarke couldn’t see it but by the sound of it, there was an arched eyebrow that accompanied the question. Lexa’s body took on certain tendencies when messing with Bellamy.

“Anya wouldn’t lie to me.” Bellamy moved his hands to his hips, the statement sounding more like a question and Clarke had to bite her lip to keep herself from laughing. Octavia, on the other hand let out a giant bark of mocking laughter, which Raven joined in on a moment later. 

“You do remember how you met her, right?” Octavia asked after catching her breath. Clarke smirked. She knew Anya’s side of the story, which was far more entertaining and didn’t hold any punches when it came to Bellamy’s ability to be a total ass. Clarke scrunched her brows and looked around the area looking for the subject of conversation.

“Fairly sure all I remember is the vinyl catsuit.” He smirked. Raven gave him a high five.

“What? She’s hot.” Raven shrugged at Octavia’s affronted expression, “Anya could totally claw me any day.”

“That could be arranged.” Purred a voice right behind Raven. Everyone turned towards the voice. Everyone except for Lexa, who was smugly smirking at the ground, and Clarke who knew the voice and that Lexa had to have set this whole conversation up. They had a weird communication thing, an ability to know exactly where the other was in a room (sometimes even a building), despite having been estranged for years and living in different cities for longer. Clarke didn’t want to play into the pun, especially with how inescapable they were when around Anya, but watching Lexa and Anya mess with her friends was a bit like watching a cat play with a mouse before eating it. They weren’t subtle in the least, especially Anya, and yet her friends went for the trap every time. Clarke secretly loved it, since her friends had a tendency to do the same to her.

“Did you find anything?” Lexa asked and silence fell on the group.

“It seems like Joker was insulted that he didn’t get an invite to the glorious Blake Masquerade.” Anya rolled her eyes as she held up a playing card with a joker’s head on it.

“This all could’ve been prevented if he’d just give me his address.” Bellamy sighed. 

“Guys, let's move this to a place where we don’t need to be wearing our ridiculous outfits.” Clarke was concerned, they needed to regroup and figure out if this was just a one off party disruption, or if this were the beginning of something more.

“You guys go on ahead, I need to discuss something with Anya momentarily.” Lexa said for the group’s benefit, Clarke had already assumed that there would need to be a discussion about the Joker situation away from the Teen Titans and Batman. Clarke was the only one of the original members who knew who the Joker once was, and she only knew because Lexa refused to hide it from her. 

“Don’t be too long.” Clarke whispered before placing a kiss on Lexa’s cheek. She hated being away from Lexa after a close call. In this line of work she should be used to it, but Clarke was all too well aware of the individuals surrounding her being mortals. There was an expiration date on everyone, but the thought of potentially losing Lexa (again) always made Clarke a bit clingy. A fact that never seemed to bother Lexa in the slightest, what with Lexa being just the same.

\---

Lexa watched the group walk away before turning to Anya who didn’t seem concerned. It being Anya, however, she wouldn’t look concerned even if she were plummeting towards a vat full of acid from the roof of an absurdly high warehouse. Lexa knew this first hand. Still, when Joker is involved, especially in relation to Bellamy, Lexa knows better than to think Anya wasn’t worried.

“For someone who doesn’t remember his accident, or any of his life prior to it, Jasper’s pretty damn focused on his former friends.” Lexa held out a hand for the calling card.

“The brain is an interesting device, we don’t even know a quarter of it’s abilities.” Anya shrugged and handed over the card, “Perhaps there’s some area in his brain that retained his life before the radioactive acid bath’s rewiring of everything.”

“Are we talking about souls here?” Lexa looked up from the card, “That there’s some cosmic magnetic force that makes our partners and friends the focus of an unhinged madman?”

“It’s not too far off of the philosophy with which we were raised.” Anya tilted her head and started walking in the opposite direction than the group. Lexa followed. “Despite all you and I have gone through, the chasm between us seemed impossible to cross, yet we still managed to find each other again. We retain our memories of each other, we’ve found our balance in life and it is on the same side.”

“Even if it’s not as squeaky clean as the Batfolk.” Lexa scoffed.

“They need our grey areas to get certain things done.” Anya reminded.

“Yes, I am aware.” Lexa opened the door that led to what she knew was the Blake cellar. Then followed Anya down stone stairs that were illuminated by led lights designed to look and flicker like torches. Something that always made Lexa and Anya roll their eyes. “So, certain people are meant to be in our lives no matter how they’re in them, and Jasper was meant to be in theirs. Which is why Joker is so focused on the Blakes, as well was Batman and Company, despite not knowing anything from before.”

“It’s my theory.” Anya nodded.

“I will share this with Clarke, though I’m fairly sure that she will still believe that we shouldn’t reveal Joker’s identity.” Lexa looked at the playing card again, flipping it over to reveal the text on the back of the card: ‘YOU SHOULD ALWAYS HAVE A JOKER AT A BALL’. There was smaller text that formed a border for the text in the middle: ‘anyone managing to disrupt the gloriously gaudy and criminally capitalistic blake’s ball of masquerading materialism shall either name their price (within reason you filth) or receive an iou from the illustrious and fabulous joker’. Lexa scoffed, “He is so annoying.”

“I know, every time we kill him he miraculously comes back to life.”

“Where did you find this?” Lexa stopped before what appeared to be a solid stone wall.

“That one was in the bushes where Deathstroke was positioned.” Anya pushed a seemingly invisible button in the wall. “But I called up our darling Ivy, who informed me that identical cards were dispersed throughout the goon channels. You know how it works.”

“Like flyers at a coffee shop.”

“Right, Mister J’s Coffee Shop of Smiles.”

“On the corner of Dark and Deadly.”

They traded quips while watching the hidden stone door slowly open, then stepped into the room of operations. Lexa refused to call it the Batcave no matter how adamant Bellamy got about it. Yes, it was a subterranean cave system, but calling it the Batcave made it seem like a glorified bachelor pad and seeing as how he was not a bachelor and it’s Octavia’s cave just as much as it’s his... Lexa would admit that Batcave was better than ‘Octavia’s Cave’ which was suggested one night by a drunk Clarke, which only led to far too much information from Clarke, Raven and Octavia about their college years and how to find “Octavia’s Treasure” and no; Lexa would prefer Batcave over that any day. 

Aside from the atrocious name, the base of operations was quite impressive. Lexa knew that it started off fairly small, with only one section having been discovered by Bellamy, Clarke and Octavia when one of their random summer adventures took a serious turn and Bellamy fell through a hole on the grounds and plummeted to his near death. Once Bellamy recovered, they had spent the rest of their days exploring the cave and eventually turned it into their lair. A place where they could plan out their vigilante justice without being noticed by Kane or anyone else who might have visited the Blake Estate. The central chamber of the base of operations, which was where Lexa and Anya were making their way to, was Lexa’s favorite chamber. It was the original room where it all started, and the trio had kept the origins of the framing and decor the same. There were opposing metals and computers, a seeming mish-mash of any objects they could find, miraculously seamed together into a training and planning area. Lexa enjoyed seeing the way that Clarke had been able to appease the strong Blake personalities by weaving their obvious and opposing decor choices together in a way that actually appealed to the eye.

“Have I told you how much I love your jawline?” Lexa heard Raven’s voice as they walked into the room shared by the rest of the group. The squad was standing around the central monitors. The majority of the group were looking up at the numerous displays showing various news coverage, information networks, and updated police scans. Lincoln was standing front and center talking to someone Lexa couldn’t see at the angle they were coming from, he seemed to be shifting between looking at the screen and his cybernetic arm. Raven was floating next to Lincoln, but looking at Octavia.

“You should, it’s ergonomically correct.” Octavia replied with a raised eyebrow and a smirk. Lexa couldn’t refrain from the loud unexpected burst of laughter that had bubbled up from the reply.

“Could you not, like, ever.” Bellamy groaned and covered his face, as if it would somehow hide him from the image his little sister had just implied. 

“Aww, Batty, your face is just as comfortable.” Raven popped up right next to Bellamy and mockingly patted his cheek. 

“We really need to stop sharing partners.” Anya spoke with a hint of amusement as her and Lexa finally joined the group.

“I know not of this sharing partner thing you are speaking of.” Lexa embraced Clarke from behind.

“Yeah, well, you two are just weird.” Raven scoffed. Then mumbled something about them not wanting to share with the class not being fair, but Lexa pretended to not hear.

“Commissioner Indra has informed us that Joker has turned himself in.” Lincoln turned around and faced the group. He pushed a button on his arm and the monitors behind him shifted into one giant screen showing the lanky man with green hair holding out his hands with a dramatic flair towards the deputy sitting at the front desk. Lincoln pushed a sequence of buttons and the screen shifted in time to Joker, who was now in a straight jacket, being led down the dark hallways that everyone in the group recognized as Arkham Asylum.

“Arkham.” Lexa stated and lifted one of the arms that was wrapped around Clarke, pretending to look at a watch, “So, he’ll be out in a day or two, depending on how long he feels like his vacation should be.”

“You’d think they’d stop putting him in a place he consistently breaks out of.” Anya huffed out a laugh, “I didn’t get around to telling you this on our walk over.” She paused to look at the rest of the group, held up the playing card and decided to catch them up as well, “Joker distributed playing cards, because he was bored and mildly affronted at not being invited to the Bourgeois Ball of the Blakes.”

“Rude! We’re so not bougie! We actually _are_ the 1% assholes, thank you.” Octavia huffily placed her hands on her hips.

“Yes, that matters to the homicidal maniac that dresses in purple suits.” Anya deadpanned before continuing, “Harley apparently convinced him, that if he turned himself in, that he’d be hitting two bats with one stone.”

“Using Harley and Joker logic, that means disrupting the Ball while robbing Batman from a criminal to apprehend?” Bellamy scratched the stubble on his jaw. Anya smiled and scratched his jaw as well.

“Using Pamela Isley and Harleen Quinzel logic, they get a vacation from Mr. J by convincing him that he should turn himself in.” Anya smirked. “From what I understand, they actually succeeded due to Joker being the shiftiest scumbag ever and never wanting to fulfill his end of a deal.”

“Not smart pissing off Deathstroke.”

“You know he did it just to mess with us, not because he cared about whatever promises Joker made.”

“Hey,” Clarke tilted her head up and spoke with a soft voice, so as to not interrupt the meeting, just for Lexa. “You really looked amazing tonight.”

“I really was looking forward to dancing with you at least once.” Lexa smiled and gave a light squeeze.

“You didn’t see how everyone was drawn to you.” Clarke tilted her head and lightly placed her lips to the spot just beneath Lexa’s earlobe. “You wanted to blend with the crowd. You were anything but common, especially in that room of abhorrent wealth. There’s no way they would’ve let us have an entire dance.”

“There is no way to prevent me from being with you.” Lexa leaned her forehead towards Clarke’s.

“We would’ve set the room afire.” Clarke nodded.

“So, no matter what, y’all wouldn’t’ve won the contest.” Raven smirked as she invaded their space, wrapping her arms around the two of them. “HUGSIES!”

“Oh, no.” Lexa cringed, but it didn’t prevent anyone other than Anya, who would never, from engulfing Clarke and Lexa in one massive hug. Lexa looked at Anya who was most definitely laughing at the current circumstance and said, “If our enemies knew they did this, we would no longer be seen as a threat.”

“As disgustingly schmoopy as this is, and I think I’m currently tasting a bit of my lunch in the back of my throat, it could be a valid tactic. Either lull them into complacency by looking like innocent and fluffy bunnies.” Anya shifted her weight, crossed her arms and tilted her head in contemplation, “Although, one could argue that this is exactly why you are viewed as such a threat.”

“Speaking of threats,” Lexa’s eyes rolled at the disgruntled groans. “We need to figure out if it was a targeted assault of Clarke, or if he just lucked into it.”

“Didn’t you say that he sneered at you?” Octavia pulled away and effectively broke the group hug.

“Yes, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that he knew who I was. It could purely be due to me looking at him before he pulled the trigger.”

“Babe, you never blend in, no matter how much you don’t want the attention.” Clarke patted Lexa’s shoulder. “It wasn’t until I saw you moving as if you were the air, that I knew for sure it was you. If he had been perched in hiding like I was, there’s no way he wouldn’t have realized.”

“But I wore white! I never wear white.” Lexa hadn’t intended that to sound so petulant, but Anya’s dismissive snort confirmed how bad it sounded.

“The Green Arrow has a very specific way of moving, Lex.” Bellamy shrugged and scratched the back of his head before draping his arm onto Anya’s shoulders. “You, have a way of moving like gravity doesn’t exist.”

“I think it’s a family trait.” Octavia nodded in agreement. “As soon as I saw how the crowd was reacting to your white outfit, and the way you moved through them, I knew it was you.” She leaned back against Lincoln’s broad chest, and pulled Raven into her arms, resting her head on Raven’s shoulder. “You looked gorgeous, by the way. Sorry we couldn’t enjoy it a bit more.”

“Yes. Well, thank you.” Lexa shifted and nodded, “You looked stunning yourself. However, this doesn’t actually say anything toward whether he planned on taking one of us out, or if it were happenstance.”

“The way Clarke appeared just when the crowd was about to crash on you like a tsunami probably gave him all sorts of hints.” Raven raised an eyebrow. “I mean, it’s not like we’ll ever understand that dude’s motivations. Ever. Especially after I vanquished dear ol' dad. Besides money, that is. Yeah, he’s got a personal fixation on this merry band of dweebs, but not even I know whose side he’s on this week. I think he wanted to mess with us, then saw the opportunity to take out you or Black Canary and took it.”

“Why won’t any of the criminals we catch stay locked up?” Lexa sighed, “I long for a vacation without explosions.”

“Aww, where’d the fun in that be, babe?” Clarke leaned in and kissed Lexa’s jaw. She moved her hand down and intertwined their fingers. “Let’s table this. My spousey was shot protecting me, I would like to get into a bed as soon as possible.”

“Uhm.” Raven blinked. Anya coughed.

“To sleep!” Clarke slammed her forehead into Lexa’s shoulder. “Why do we insist on spending time with these people.”

“Couldn’t save the world without them.” Lexa stroked Clarke’s hair. “But yes, you trying people. I do feel the effects of the shock setting in.” Lexa turned them around and headed towards the door, but not before saying over her shoulder, “May we meet again.”


End file.
